In a Wi-Fi to cellular (e.g., Long Term Evolution or LTE) bridging scenario, data traffic may start at a Wi-Fi access point and may be routed to cellular backhaul. Cellular networks enable different types of traffic to be handled with different quality levels of service. This is done with quality of service (QoS) identifiers associated with radio bearers, which are tunnels which encapsulate datagrams as they travel through the network to a packet gateway. In some cases, it is possible to identify the appropriate quality of service. For example, for unencrypted and unencapsulated data traffic, a protocol header may be visible for determining whether a datagram is for a real-time application such as real time protocol (RTP) or for a non-interactive application such as hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP). However, this is not an option for encapsulated or encrypted traffic. This is also not possible for data that is received at an evolved packet data gateway (ePDG) gateway for providing LTE core network access to Wi-Fi users, as such traffic is encapsulated in a tunnel.
LTE quality of service and the quality of service class indicator (QCI) are further described in 3GPP TS 23.203, “Policy and charging control architecture,” which is hereby incorporated herein in its entirety.
Wi-Fi networks, such as those using the IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, etc. protocols, use a service set identifier (SSID) to identify a service set, or a set of nodes that are part of a particular wireless local area network. This identifier is sometimes commonly called the “network name.” The SSID appears in the header of certain frames that are sent over a wireless local area network (WLAN). For further reference, the IEEE 802.11-2007 standard, “Part 11: Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) specifications” is hereby incorporated herein in its entirety.